


night has always pushed up day

by cosmonautically



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: F/M, Gen, Grief/Mourning
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-10
Updated: 2019-03-10
Packaged: 2019-11-15 02:43:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 748
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18065048
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cosmonautically/pseuds/cosmonautically
Summary: A curious thing, grief. It rattled around inside a person, striking the heart whenever it pleased.





	night has always pushed up day

**Author's Note:**

  * For [escherzo](https://archiveofourown.org/users/escherzo/gifts).



> For a dear friend on Twitter.

At times, it felt like a feather, weighing lightly on her shoulders. But the times when it felt like a boulder on her chest were the hardest. Vex could hardly press forward then, wondering how she could possibly live without her brother. How was she supposed to continue on with her best friend gone forever? Where was the sunlight now? Gone, with Vax’s smile. 

Percy, her darling love, supported her as a stalwart tree to lean on. He began to recognize the days that were more difficult than others, knew with a look. Vex knew in her heart that she was not alone, but with her brother gone, it was hard to remember. She had relied on him for so long. 

When the weight was heavy, Vex would seek out Percy’s warmth. Percy, strong and steady, who had seen his own grief and pressed through it. Percy, who passed through shadow and through the veil of darkness, who knew that monster far better than she. 

They’d fall into each other on those days, each wearing a different form of grief, cloaks of different colors but made of the same fibers woven together. They whispered memories to one another, laughing and crying in turn. Percy would let Vex grieve the way she needed to, holding onto him. Every day was a different sorrow, each with a different answer. 

On this day, she found him in his shop as he tinkered on some new invention, something she knew he’d told her about but that she couldn’t remember through the haze of desolation. He looked up from his work, glasses perched on the end of his nose. He watched her for a moment as she brushed her fingers across his tools and curios. 

Percy knew then. A curious thing, grief. It rattled around inside a person, striking the heart whenever it pleased. He set down his tools, and moved around the work table to Vex. Her arms were crossed over her chest, as she clutched to herself. Words weren’t needed now. He reached up to graze this thumb against her cheek. 

Vex was always the first to move, her soft lips pressing to his ravenously. Her tenacity frightened him in times like this. She pressed to him as if he too were going away, eager to keep him as close as possible. The table rattled as Vex pushed Percy against it. He made a sound, breaking away from her for a moment. Her eyes were glistening, tears pooling. 

“Darling,” he murmured, cupping her cheek as he stroked his thumb across her skin. “I’m here.”

Vex didn’t say a word, only bowed her head and leaned into him. He wrapped his arms around her, holding her in there in the quiet solitude of his shop. Vex had never been loud in her grief, and this was no different. He wouldn’t have known she was crying if he hadn’t felt his shirt growing more and more damp where her face was pressed against him. 

She was grateful for Percy in these moments. He, who knew her so well, almost as well as Vax. It had been only a year since the Raven Queen had claimed her brother and yet Percy had come to know her nearly better than she knew herself. 

It had been that time heals all wounds, but Vex was sure this was a wound that would never heal. She knew it would scar, the hole in her heart patched. Percy helped. Keyleth helped. And in time, the hole did indeed grow smaller. 

When her first child entered the world, she cried as she held him, seeing so much of her brother in his perfect face. Her Vax had returned in some small way. And as the boy grew, he reminded her so much of him that the hole nearly disappeared. 

But every day, a raven would visit. And remind Vex of what she had lost. She would smile now, as she never had before. She would tell her son of his uncle, of the joy that they had shared. Keeping his memory alive proved easier and easier with each new morning. With each birth of a child, the hole grew smaller until it was no longer there. Vex missed Vax more than anything, but with her children and Percy, life was easier to bear without him. On the day that she passed, her children saw the raven joined by another, and knew that their mother had finally found her peace.


End file.
